My Depression Diagnosis: Getting Help In Real Time

Six weeks ago I received a depression diagnosis, signed off work and given a prescription for prozac. This is my story so far.

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The first few days

Last night I took the pill. Washed it back with a glass of water.

Three seconds later I was panicking. Freaking out. Losing it. I texted a friend, confirmed I was just being crazy, not actually going crazy.

That night I woke myself up trying to scream out as some nightmare enveloped me. Eventually I fell asleep again. Sometime later my son screamed out too. It was going to be one of those nights. I woke feeling exhausted with a headache.

I went to see a flat. As I left, I felt anxious. Really anxious. It’s strange, not knowing if you’re anxious cause you’re anxious or anxious because of the medication – is my anxiety even real? Does it even matter?

My mum was taking my son and his cousin for the afternoon. I had high hopes for how I could spend the time. Swimming. Cycling. Getting away from everything. I came home and collapsed in bed. My head was hurting. Not a headache, but some strange deep aching. I drifted in and out of sleep, constantly disturbed by the building works going on in some neighbouring flat. Perhaps that was good, how would I sleep tonight if I slept all afternoon?

I’ve only taken one pill. One miniscule pill. Yet I feel so spaced out I don’t know what’s going on. I’ve asked my mum to stay the night. I don’t feel safe alone. The world feels so fuzzy. I feel sluggish. I have no way of knowing if this is me, me now I’ve decided to stop keeping on regardless. Or if this is the meds. I was told they can make you feel spaced out to start with. I’m hoping that’s all it is.

By about 6pm the fuzziness wore off. I took the next pill at 9pm. No panic attack this time. Then I sat here and wrote. And you know what, I went to bed not feeling quite so low as usual.

The next day I had a call from the nurse about my referral to the mental health team. Apparently it will take one year. One year! I’m pretty sure I’ll be dead or fine by that point.

By day four the med-induced fog was starting to lift. Only there was a part of me that felt guilty. This was just pretending; pretending through pills.

One week down

Physically the meds have taken their toll on me. It feels like the first trimester of pregnancy… spaced out, going off the taste of food, waking feeling sick for the first few hours of the day. Unable to sleep, yet feeling tired. There’s a dose of anxiety thrown in for good measure too. But I do feel (slightly) stronger mentally. I’ve not had meltdowns at the smallest of things (quite so regularly), the tears are less frequent and I don’t feel quite so despondent about life. What’s more, in the swimming pool changing rooms I dried and dressed myself without feeling self-conscious. I hadn’t even realised I was ashamed. It’s moments like that when you realise quite how much the depression has affected your all and everything that you no longer know what normal is.

It’s not been a magic pill don’t get me wrong (and I’m still hoping for more improvements in the weeks to come). I continue to question if people like me but at the moment I’m not quite so bothered by the answer. I’m trying to focus on those who I know do care about me. Those who have prioritised me. One of my best friends disappeared in a puff of smoke when I split with my partner. Every time I’ve looked back on that over the last two years it’s broken my heart. But today I thought about her and didn’t really feel anything. It’s incredibly lightening.

Only there is this fear which continues to chip away at me, the fear which stopped me taking this path of medication in the first place and that is that it’s not real. That these feelings are only there because of the meds. That I am just tricking myself to be OK with my life when in actual fact I’m not happy so why am I pretending. I know others may say the depression is what lies to you. And perhaps it does. But perhaps the meds do too. It’s very confusing.

Having time off work I have felt like this is pretty much the maximum amount of stress I can currently cope with. I mean, looking after my son and the house, maybe a little bit of writing too. That’s it. I’m scared to go back to work and I’m scared not to go back. The longer I leave it the harder it will be, in emotional terms of seeing colleagues, and in terms of workload which is piling up in my absence.

I’ve found my son more of a challenge the last week or two. He’s been incredibly toddler-ish. By that I mean, jumping around crazy. Random outburst of screams and frustrations. I don’t know if it’s a coincidence or if it’s linked to how I am, probably the latter. It doesn’t really matter either way. Its been hard in the mornings, waking up feeling sick as a dog and him wanting to run straight downstairs for breakfast. I’ve told him mummy is sick, and it’s true.

I changed to taking the meds in the morning in the hope it will help with the insomnia. Weirdly it seemed to knock me out entirely. This afternoon I fell asleep on the sofa whilst little one was watching nursery rhymes on youtube. Now I’m up and it’s nearly midnight.

I’ve been feeling like I need to sort everything out – decide what I want to do with the rest of my life: should I have another kid? move home? change jobs? all of the above? It all became so overwhelming. So in the end I decided nothing.

The anxiety isn’t budging. It’s like living on a boat that’s constantly swaying creating a general sense of nervousness.

A couple of friends explained taking anti-depressants as a way to unlock a blockage. On Sunday the unblocking seemed to come. It wasn’t pleasant. I was walking along the road and I just couldn’t keep it in any longer. I felt so sad and angry that now I could see what had been going on for the last two years with my ex yet no-one had helped me to do anything about it. I had no idea they had things like respite care for mothers with babies. That’s exactly what I needed. I phoned my mum and cried in the middle of one of the busiest streets in London as I lamented all that had happened in those years. I had a social worker but once my ex was gone literally all I got was a phone call, I guess in reality it was ‘his’ social worker. For two years despite barely setting foot in the place, I allowed my ex to have all the power in my home when he claimed he had none. His abusive messages would send me reeling. I never had the chance to deal with it, to think about it with a straight brain. I had a breastfed baby who was permanently attached to me and that made breathing hard enough, let alone thinking. I just kept going because I feared what would happen if I paused. I felt so angry that no-one just grabbed me and made me stop.

It reminds me of when I was a kid and my brother used to put his hand on my head and tell me to punch him. It’s impossible. It doesn’t matter how much energy you have, nothing will enable you to reach them.

Slowly I seem to be adjusting to these new chemicals in my brain. I’m hardly feeling sick in the morning and I’ve managed to do *slightly* better with the housework though I still haven’t cleaned the bathroom in weeks (months?), but it’s a start.

Week six

Somehow I’ve made it through to six weeks since.

Writing this as the days pass has been an eye-opener. What I described as a ‘lightening’ in the first weeks, is now starting to feel more like an emptiness.

I survived my first week back at work. I won’t deny it was hard. On the last day of my first week back I came home exhausted. I could tell little one was also tired so I fed us both and took us straight to bed. It was 6.30pm. I knew if we stayed up it would end in tears, his and (if only I could get my ducts to produce some actual watery substance) mine too. We read books. Cuddled and snuggled together and eventually fell asleep. It was beautiful.

The nightmares have been getting worse. Vivid dreams. About my ex. About dead babies in the ground. About things I don’t quite remember by the morning time but know that in the middle of the night they felt incredibly real and frightening.

I’m not quite so angry. I don’t feel like every little comment is a dig designed to put me down, a hint at how bad a person I am (mother, friend, sibling you name it).

My thoughts are all of a muddle. Writing is almost impossible, it feels like I’m wading through mud most of the time. Thick, gloopy mud that doesn’t want my thoughts to go free. Every few minutes I have to stop and refocus my brain. What was I thinking about again? Reading my son a picture book and the wrong word comes out of my mouth. I’m not sure why. Is it the meds? Is it the exhaustion of all the stresses of the last three years finally taking their toll? It feels a bit like baby brain.

The excessive emotions are being damped down too. Though I’m not so sure I like that. It’s a novelty going for more than three days without crying but sometimes I want to cry. Sometimes I need to cry. Occasionally I can get the first few ones to well up and fall and then they just disappear into nothing. A good cry can actually feel good and it’s been a feature of my life for so long now it feels like I’ve lost someone close to me.

Throughout these six weeks though the one thought that keeps coming back is that I don’t really like my life. I mean, it’s OK. And my son is amazing don’t get me wrong. But I don’t feel like I have this ‘village’ everyone keeps talking about. I’m trying to build one, but it’s hard going. And I know without a doubt I want someone to share my life with. Someone to fall asleep with, someone to wake up with, someone to argue with about the washing up, someone to snap at when they leave the loo seat up, someone to hug when times are tough, someone to laugh with when times are good. And I want more kids, it’s an aching desire inside me and I fear the clock is ticking. The meds can’t make my life change. They can’t make me love that life. All they are doing is making me have less passion to grieve the loss of that life. Maybe in time I will be ‘better’. But what does ‘better’ even mean? Does it mean giving up on my dreams? Does it mean just accepting the shitty hand I have been dealt? At the moment, I’m just not sure I get it. I feel like something is missing but I don’t have the energy to miss it. It’s a strange feeling – a fog-like feeling.

Does it ever end?

I have some things in place. I am distancing myself from my ex (as much as is possible when we have a child together). I’ve gone to the CSA to sort the child maintenance payments to hopefully ensure I get some regular payments and to minimise any contact I have to have with the man himself. I’ve got some CBT set up and an assessment for some more long-term counselling. I’ve booked an appointment with a homeopathy clinic. I’ve never used homeopathy before but I’m willing to give anything a go to move myself forward

I still look at all those facebook pictures of happy families and it makes me sad. The only difference is now I don’t cry, I feel empty instead. I’m still not sure if the aim is that one day I will have one of those photos myself, or if one day I will be happy with the photo I already have.

 

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Support

If you are suffering from mental ill-health there are a number of charities which you can contact in the UK. MIND, Samaritans and Rethink are some of the better known ones who can provide support and advice. This is a list of mental health organisations specialising in key areas such as the elderly, youth and people with learning difficulties.

Women’s Aid are the key charity in the UK providing support to people experiencing physical, sexual or emotional abuse in their homes.

If you liked this post you might also like these posts from me on related issues: Missing in Action – My Son’s First Years. How Mental Health Campaigns Are Missing the Point. This Shit Just Got Real.